


Regarding The Ill-Adviced Union of Borscht, Subterfuge, and Claustrophobia

by BenevolentErrancy



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Claustrophobia, F/M, M/M, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-14
Updated: 2015-02-14
Packaged: 2018-03-12 20:11:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3353756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BenevolentErrancy/pseuds/BenevolentErrancy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Today was a good day, Joly thought to himself. His last exam had been taken yesterday, he had just eaten an enormous meal, it was beginning to snow, and his girlfriend was spread across his chest kissing him into oblivion – there was very little that could ruin a day like today he figured as he pulled Musichetta’s warm weight closer to him.</p>
<p>Or at least, that’s what he thought until Musichetta jerked up right abruptly, uttered a sharp “shit”, and pushed Joly off the couch.</p>
<p>“Ow! ‘Chetta, what?” he attempted to ask, but the faint rattling of keys could then be heard from outside the apartment door and Joly understood.</p>
<p>“You need to hide,” Musichetta hissed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Regarding The Ill-Adviced Union of Borscht, Subterfuge, and Claustrophobia

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the kink meme prompt: "One of the Amis ( preferably Joly) gets stuck somehow (like wedged in a hole, between walls, etc.) and starts to freak out (claustrophobic maybe?) so the others comfort them. Make it fluffy and ill love you forever. Bonus points if they're stuck because they're stuffed."  
> http://makinghugospin.livejournal.com/14280.html?thread=14001608#t14001608

Today was a good day, Joly thought to himself. His last exam had been taken yesterday, making this the first official day of his winter break, which he was spending at Musichetta’s apartment. He had just eaten an enormous meal, it was beginning to snow, and his girlfriend was spread across his chest kissing him into oblivion – there was very little that could ruin a day like today he figured as he pulled Musichetta’s warm weight closer to him.

Or at least, that’s what he thought until Musichetta jerked up right abruptly, uttered a sharp “ _shit_ ”, and pushed Joly off the couch.

“Ow! ‘Chetta, what?” he attempted to ask, but the faint rattling of keys could then be heard from outside the apartment door and Joly understood.

“You need to hide,” Musichetta hissed.

“Where?” demanded Joly – Musichetta’s living room wasn’t large and wasn’t exactly rife with places for a grown man to hide convincingly but at the same time he doubted he could run to her bedroom before her roommate got the door open. Honestly, everyone’s life would be a lot easier if she just explained their relationship to her roommate, but apparently this roommate was a rather sheltered, religious girl and Musichetta was “waiting for the right time”.

“Under the cabinet!”

Musichetta’s tone was just so that Joly very nearly  _did_  dive under the cabinet without a second thought, but common sense stilled him.

“Are you serious?”

The cabinet in question was a monstrous wooden thing that Joly knew belonged to ‘Chetta’s roommate’s father and which now held a collection of movies, knick-knack and tableware. Huge, intricate, and antique, it was a daunting figure in the small room and did, admittedly, have a little space between its bottom and the floor.

“Yes! It’ll be fine, trust me.”

Joly was tempted to point out what so often happened when he and Bossuet "trusted" Musichetta's more harebrained schemes but any other reservations Joly might have had were silenced by the sound of the apartment door being wrestled open. Without another thought, Joly dropped to his stomach and squirmed under. For one glorious moment, it seemed like Joly would fit just fine after all! And then the moment ended.

He knew he shouldn’t have had that third helping of borscht.

“Cosette! Welcome home! How was class?”

“…’Chetta, why are there a pair of legs sticking out from under the cabinet?”

“…I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Joly groaned.

 

“Is this the bald boy that you had here a few weeks ago? The one you’re seeing? M. Lesgle is that you?”

“Um,” said Joly, trying to wiggle out from where he was stuck. His body didn’t seem to want to move in either direction though.

“No… no that’s not Lesgle, that’s… no,” said Musichetta slowly.

“Oh? Oh! Oh. Um, oh.” Joly had only seen Musichetta’s roommate a couple times but he knew that the girl was probably bright red right now. It was a very vocal blush. He found he couldn’t be overly concerned for her discomfort though because his was mounting by the second. He was breathing in dust and he was not happy about it and would really like to get out  _right now_ …

“I thought you and Lesgle were… But it’s none of my business! Um, does he… know…?”

Joly laughed, though it came out a bit more like a cry. Did Bossuet know? Bossuet, who was basically Joly’s right hand and had been since either could remember?

“’Chetta?” he called tentatively, trying his best not to breathe in any more dust than necessary. “’Chetta, I think I need some help…”

“You got in there, can’t you get out?” Musichetta replied. “Suck in your gut a little. Okay, listen, Cosette, I was waiting for the right time to explain this and I had kind of hoped it wouldn’t involve Joly with his feet dangling out from under a piece of furniture but here’s how it is…”

Joly listened to Musichetta outline their relationship because he felt the growing need to focus on  _something_. It was very cramped under the cabinet. And quite dark. And dusty. He tried to suck his stomach in and wiggle backwards but all that came of it was painful pinching and slight nausea from abusing his very full tummy so much.

“You really didn’t need to try to hide your boyfriend…s away, you know,” Cosette said sweetly. She was probably smiling, it was almost as loud as her blush, and Joly felt strangely resentful even though he knew he should be happy that this was all going so smoothly after all Musichetta’s worries. “You could have just told me. As long as you’re happy, I’m happy for you, ‘Chetta. I’d love to meet them properly.”

“Y-you could meet me now,” Joly called desperately, “if you got me out of here.”

“Are you really that stuck, babe?” Musichetta asked. He felt her hand touch the back of his leg, making him start a little. She must have knelt down.

“I promise I’m not down here for the view,” he said solemnly. His voice ended up cracking a little though. “Please help me out.”

“Okay, give us a sec – Cosette would you…?”

He heard Cosette laugh – it was a very nice, clear sound he thought, a little hysterically – and then felt two pairs of hands grab his ankles and  _pull_ –

“Ow!  _Ow!_  Stop!”

“Oh god, are you okay Joly? You’re really stuck.”

Joly moaned and tried to catch his breath, sucking up more dust that caught in his throat and made him cough, and keep coughing between wheezy gasps for more air.

“Joly, are you okay? Hey, deep breaths, love, it’s okay.”

That was a recognizable tone, the one Musichetta took when a panic attack was approaching but Joly hadn’t realized he was panicking. As his breathe hitched though he realized that maybe it might be because of more than just dust. It was so cramped under here, and it was so dark and the dust kept stirring around him with every breathe and he tried not to think about all the bacteria that bred in common household dust.

“Pull me out, please, ‘Chetta, pull me out,” he gasped, breath becoming less and less steady and more and more recognizable as maybe panic. Musichetta was clever like that, at recognizing how he was feeling before even he had noticed. He tried to stamp it down. To breathe. Like Musichetta was telling him to as she rubbed his leg.

“Okay, love, we’re going to pull again, it’ll hurt for a second and then you’ll be free, okay? Cosette? Okay, three, two…”

He bit his lip, he really tried to handle the pain that came, but he couldn’t and he was soon calling for them to stop. He hadn’t moved at all, he realized with a sinking heart. If anything he felt even more stuck. Oh god what if he was stuck here indefinitely? What if they couldn’t get him out? What would they do? What would he do? How sturdy was this cabinet, anyway? Was that it creaking? Was the bottom bending? Was it getting closer? It felt smaller. Like his air was being pressed out and replaced with walls and dust and, oh god oh god, he couldn’t  _breathe_.

“Four in, sweetie, four in,” Musichetta’s calm, authoritative voice commanded and Joly desperately tried, sucking air slowly into his lungs but it was filled with the dust and he couldn’t hold it even if he tried and he started coughing and just could not stop. Even as she called placations and gentle commands he couldn’t stop, couldn’t stop coughing and wheezing, couldn’t find a deep enough or long enough breath – couldn’t bring himself to because each breath was coating his lungs with dust and each breath was pulling the walls in tighter. He sobbed. This was ridiculous, but he still couldn’t stop.

–

“Cosette, please just – stay with him for a moment, I need to make a call. I’m so sorry about this but… please.”

Cosette didn’t know what to do – she barely even knew who the man under her papa’s cabinet was, didn’t know what was happening exactly – but she nodded immediately, moved to heart-aching compassion by the sounds of distress coming from the stranger. So when her roommate jumped to her feet to dig her phone out of the couch cushions, Cosette knelt down in her place and held the trembling calf as she had seen Musichetta do.

“It’s going to be okay, Joly,” she told him. “Musichetta’s brilliant, you know that. We’ll figure something out. Just… just calm down a little, okay?” This didn’t seem to make any difference in the erratic, panicked breathing.

With the desperate need to do something, Cosette dropped onto her stomach and reached under the cabinet, groping until her hand found one of Joly’s tightly knit fists. She wrapped her fingers around it, stroked it with her thumb, until the fingers relaxed somewhat and knotted with hers. He squeezed her hand tight enough to make the joints ache but she continued to stroke the back with her thumb.

“See,” she said gently, “we’re right here. I’m right here. It’s going to be okay, Joly, just try to breathe a little slower.” A terrible thought struck her. “You… you can breathe okay right?”

–

Could he breathe?

Suddenly he wasn’t sure.

This should be something he should know. Something that he should be very intimately aware of – but if he couldn’t tell if he was breathing or not, did that mean he wasn’t? It certainly felt like he couldn’t be, not properly, not with how hard it was to suck air past the rabbiting heartbeat in this throat. How much dust could you breathe in before you were breathing more of it than air? Was he getting enough air? Was he feeling light-headed from lack of oxygen? Or was the floor actually shifting under him, trying to compress him. He just  _didn’t know_  and there wasn’t even Musichetta’s calm voice informing him that he absolutely was still breathing, just too fast, too shallow, instructing him and grounding him.

Could he breathe?

“ _No_ ,” he choked out desperately, just wanting this to stop, it  _needed to stop_. He couldn’t do his breathings to calm down because it just made him cough and he  _couldn’t breathe_.

“Oh my goodness!” he heard from somewhere outside of his dust-enclosed hell. “Do you have asthma? Do you have an inhaler? It’s going to be okay, don’t worry, Joly!”

He didn’t have an inhaler! Did he need one? Would he get asthma? Oh god, he might. What if he would never breathe properly again, what if it was always like a panic attack, when air was thin and hard won. What if he got fibrosis? What if it stopped his lungs from functioning properly and he died here trying to gasp for breath under his girlfriends stupid cabinet–!

“Cosette!” he heard distantly but he couldn’t focus on it.  _He was going to die here, die here, die here, crushed in the dark by constricting walls and scarred lungs, oh god oh god ohgod_  “Cosette you  _cannot_  say something that! He has hypochondria and is already in the middle of a panic attack–!”

What were they saying? Were they diagnosing him? It sounded like it but he couldn’t focus on their words past the shrill humming in his ears, as if the dust and dark was forcing its way into his head and screaming. Did they know that he was going to die here? Weren’t they going to save him?

“Joly! Joly, sweetheart, listen to me. It’s ‘Chetta, Joly, listen to me.”

A familiar hand was on his leg and didn’t help because it was so far away, his legs were so distant, so apart from where he was trapped. He wanted to be out there with his legs. How did this happen?

“You’re okay, Joly. You  _are not sick_. You do not have asthma, Joly, you know that. You’ve gotten tested. And you’re not going to get asthma, it’s just a little claustrophobia. We’re going to get you out and you’re going to be okay, love. Can you hear me? Four in, Joly. Deep breathes.”

He wanted to, he really did, but his throat was getting tighter and tighter like the dust was building up a block. “Can’t breathe,” he sobbed.

“Yes you can, Joly. Here…”

There was the sound of fumbling and then light, blessed  _light_  appeared. If he crinked his neck just so he could see a familiar hand – not the one that was still tightly grasped in his, but the delicate, dark hand that had been holding him only minutes (hours, days?) earlier – push a phone toward him, the screen lighting up the confine space and making the dust glint like individual devil eyes.

“ _J_ _oly?_ ” a voice called tinnily over the phone speaker.

“B-Boss-Bossuet,” Joly answered back, desperate for his boyfriend’s voice.

“ _Good to hear your voice, Jols,_ ” said Bossuet from the other end of the phone. “ _You breathing for me?_ ”

Joly shook his head before realizing that Bossuet couldn’t see him. If he wanted to talk to him, he would have to find the breath to speak. “T-trying.”

“ _That’s great, Joly._ ”

“S’too dusty,” Joly tried to explain. The cough that clawed its way from his dry, tight throat wasn’t intended but served as a good emphasis all the same. “Can’t breathe.”

He could feel Musichetta’s hand tighten on his leg and Cosette’s hand tighten in his.

“ _Guess we’ll have to bully Musichetta into actually cleaning her apartment later, eh?_ ” Bossuet said with forced levity. Bossuet was a very light-hearted person, could laugh at any of his own misfortunes, but Joly knew Bossuet inside and out and could tell that this tone was forced. He tried to swallow the panic that unfurrowed in his chest at that thought. He would be okay. Musichetta and Bossuet were here and it wasn’t so dark anymore with the lit phone screen. The walls couldn’t compress if he was watching them.

“I want out,” he begged softly.

“ _I know. I’m on my way over right now and we’ll figure something out. I’m parking right now, okay?_ ”

“W-” When the word couldn’t come out, Joly swallowed thickly a few times – his throat was so dry  _so dusty so dusty too dusty_  – and tried again. “Work?”

“He’s probably jealous of you stealing his show, babe. Can’t let you hog his limelight of misfortune,” Musichetta said at the same time Bossuet informed him: “ _Mme Hucheloup said she could handle things for me. Okay, I’m just outside the door, so I’m going to hang up, okay?_ ”

This, as far as Joly was concerned, was absolutely not okay but he made a choked noise that Bossuet must have taken as an affirmative because the door bell suddenly rang and Musichetta’s hand was gone and the phone went black.

And he was in the darkness again. The noise he made wasn’t quite a shriek and wasn’t quite a sob but it was doing its best to be both. Cosette’s thumb continued its reassuring track.

“Hey there, Joly.”

And Joly melted a little inside. It was still oppressively dark and he still couldn’t breathe without feeling dust tickle his nose and throat and, he swore, his lungs, but he could hear both Bossuet and Musichetta right next to him, there for him. They always made sure he was okay, maybe he would be okay.

“You really got yourself into a scrape, huh?”

“S’Chetta’s fault,” Joly said, a little petulantly.

Bossuet laughed and Musichetta made indignant noises.

“Okay, how are we going to get you out of there?” Bossuet said, though he sounded more like he was speaking to himself than Joly.

Joly still answered with “Quickly” though, because it needed to be said and it made Bossuet laugh.

“You already tried just, I dunno, pulling?” Bossuet asked.

“Yeah, believe it or not we covered that before going to your expert opinion,” Musichetta said.

“…We could try butter?” It was Cosette that piped up with this suggestion. “I mean, when I can’t get a ring off I’ll grease it a little so maybe it’s the same idea…?”

“It couldn’t hurt to try,” Bossuet agreed.

“I’ll get the butter,” Musichetta sighed. “But I’m not cleaning the floor after.”

Joly felt her hand leave and heard her shuffle away. He tried to time his breathing with her steps.

“Hey, you’re breath’s spiking a bit there,” Bossuet said calmly, stroking the back of his thigh. “You were doing pretty good keeping it even before. Still okay?”

“I want out,” was all Joly could say because that was all he wanted. Out. To not be surrounded with dust and creaking wood that might crush him at any moment and which he swore seemed to shrink more every second.

“We’ll have you out in a jiff, Jol, don’t worry. Want anything else until then?”

“…Light?” Light had helped.

“I think I have a flashlight in my travel bag,” Cosette said.

And so with a little bit of coaxing, Joly returned Cosette’s hand to her and she too marched away down the hall. And then it was only Joly and Bossuet and Joly’s breath stuttered again.

“Don’t leave,” he gasped immediately.

“I’m not going anyone, Joly,” Bossuet promised. “Want to hear about this one customer I got?” he continued, tactfully not mentioning the little sobbing sounds that he must surely hear as Joly’s resolve crumbled again and he couldn’t keep it in any longer. Bossuet rambled, stroking in long, even strokes up his leg that Joly was able to try to time his breathing to. Anything to distract himself.

Quickly Cosette reappeared, the clatter of her heels distinct from Musichetta’s socks, and a little flashlight was turned on and placed under the cabinet. It helped, just a little. Shortly after, Musichetta also padded back into the room.

“I have no idea how we’re going to do this,” she admitted.

Regardless, a valiant effort was made. Joly could feel the brick of butter pressed against his side and fingers, with difficulty, trying to probe the little space between his body and the surfaces he was stuck against to spread it to the actual problem area.

“If you stopped giggling this might be easier,” Bossuet told him, but he jabbed his fingers at Joly’s side again as he tried to press the butter smeared over them between him and the floor, and it made Joly nearly shriek with laughter.

“You know I’m ticklish,” Joly cried, jerking and laughing as fingers kept pressing at him. The gasps for air left him coughing and chest ached because there really wasn’t enough room to try to laugh, making all his breaths aborted and sporadic. Despite this though, he felt the best he had since getting stuck – they were going to get him out, he was going to get out, he was barely even stuck anymore with his friends working at freeing him and the light on and laughter in his chest.

“Okay,” he heard Musichetta say. “I think we’ve succeeded in ruining your clothes and I don’t think there’s any way of doing any more so… on three?”

Heart pounding with excitement and nerves, freedom imminent, Joly braced himself.

“ _STOP! Ow ow ow!_ ”

The hands that had been pulling at him let go and Joly lay in the cramped space, head pressed miserably against the ground as he stared into the dark corners beneath the cabinet. Nothing had happened. He hadn’t moved. If anything, he’d only succeeded in cracking a rib.

Oh god.

“Hey Joly, it’ll be okay, we’ll have you out of there in no time.” That was Cosette’s voice and it was strange that Cosette had gone from being a relative stranger to feeling like a fast friend.  It looked like having one of your roommate's boyfriends hyperventilate under a piece of your furniture was a way to make friends, who knew? Desperately, Joly tried to take solace in her soft, sweet voice but he could feel the sobs coming up again. He thought he’d managed to push the panic down to manageable levels but it was coming back with a vengeance. He was never going to get out of here and his ribs hurt even more.

“Come on, Jolllly, I’m here,” Bossuet said. “Obviously the first plan couldn’t work; the universe would be tipped off its axis if it made it that easy for me. We’ll get it though.” Bossuet’s voice was filled with false cheer that only served to scare Joly more – they really had no idea how they were going to get him out of here.

He started thrashing then, not caring how much it made his skin pinch and ribs ache he needed to get out.

“Joly! Stay still! You’re going to hurt yourself, Joly!” Musichetta’s voice called, a hand coming down on his leg, trying to pin it. With a sort of pettiness and rising fear, he desperately kicked out, trying to get the hand, all the hands, off him, they were trying to keep him trapped and he needed to get out. He was crying fiercely again, he knew it, could feel his face getting soppy and the dust stuck to it and itched.

“Joly, Jolllly, Jol– _ouch!_ ”

Joly stopped moving immediately; he’d felt his foot come into contact with something solid besides the floor and heard the pain in Bossuet’s voice and made the leap.

“’Suet?” he asked tentatively. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, no worries, it’s nothing. Just bopped my nose. Was bound to happen at some point.”

“M’sorry,” he whispered into the floor.

“It’s okay, Joly. You know me, that was nothing. That was a love tap.” He felt lips press against his leg. He clenched his fists and tried not to think of how much he wanted those lips against his own, or how he had had his pressed against Musichetta’s just this afternoon, how he would never get to feel them again if he was trapped under here forever.

“I want out.” It felt stupid to say again. Obviously he wanted out, everyone knew that – he’d been sobbing pathetically only a couple minutes earlier, like some sort of kid who’s afraid of the dark – but he still felt the need to say it.

“I know, babe,” Musichetta said. “We’ll figure it out.”

And then the brainstorming, such as it was, began. Joly tried to pay attention but mostly he was too busy breathing. Bossuet’s must be lying on his stomach now, Joly figured, because one of his hands had snaked under the cabinet to take Joly’s and his other was pressed against his thigh. It tightened and loosened rhythmically, and was obviously a counted pattern for Joly to try to emulate with his breaths. It was hard, with the dust and the coughs and the desperate need to sob that kept leaping up from the depths of his guts, and no matter what he did his heart rate didn’t seem to want to go down, but Joly fought it.

“I think we’ll have to move it,” Cosette’s voice said. “I don’t know how we’ll manage it, but I can’t think of anything else.”

There was a pause after this statement and the image of Joly’s wooden prison sprung up in his mind’s eye. A huge, bulky behemoth of household furniture, he’d always been amazed that they had even gotten it into the apartment; it surely weighed a ton.

“We could empty it…” Cosette was saying. “And maybe if we all tried together?”

“Grantaire!” Bossuet said suddenly. “Grantaire was telling me last night how he had talked Bahorel into going with him to one of his dance classes today! It’s on this side of town and they should probably be wrapping up soon!”

Joly felt a sliver of hope swell in his chest. If anyone could lift the cabinet it would be the two of their friends who excelled in physical sports and boxed at least twice a week together.

“I’ll call them,” Musichetta offered and Joly tightened his hand around Bossuet’s, relieved not to be denied that one comfort.

For a while, Joly could hear movement around him and it made him antsy. But there was direction to it again, and the flashlight still shone, and Bossuet was still gently squeezing his leg and breathing with him. After a little while he heard Cosette put something on the floor next to the cabinet and concluded it must be a laptop when he heard a mouse clicking. In a few minutes the first strains of “Circle of Life” could be heard and a smile snuck onto his face.

“I could get a pillow for you, if you like,” Cosette offered. “We could stuff it under the cabinet so you wouldn’t have to be lying against the floor.”

Images of large, over-stuffed pillow being crammed underneath with him, of it taking up the little space he had, of it being pressed against his face and suffocating him exploded through his head and it was all he could do to squeak out a terrified “No thanks.”

Eventually Musichetta came back, told them all that after ringing the phone no less than half a dozen times Grantaire had picked up, irritable and out of breath, but had promised that he and Bahorel would be right over, to give them ten minutes. In the meantime, she and Cosette started rummaging in the cabinet, emptying it so it would be at least a little lighter. And even though Joly knew that was what they were doing, he still wiggled enough to press his free hand against his ear, to try to block of what sounded surely like the entire cabinet about to give in under its own weight and crush him.

“Did you know there have been studies that have found antibiotic-resistant bacteria in common household dust?” he said after a minute, because trying not to think of one fear seemed to do nothing but send his mind spiralling towards another.

“Really?” Cosette asked conversationally but somebody must have hissed something at her because it was followed by a muted “Oh gosh, I forgot, I’m sorry.”

“Okay, but which do you prefer?” Bossuet asked loudly, drowning out Musichetta’s assurance to Cosette that it was okay and Joly’s own panicked thoughts. “Simba and Nala or Kiara and Kovu? Or Mufasa and… what was Simba’s mother’s name?”

“Sarabi,” Joly supplied immediately. “It was Sarabi.”

“Ah, right! She’s amazing – she doesn’t get all that much screen time but dang, she’s a really awesome character. Takes absolutely none of Scar’s shit.”

Joly hummed in agreement.

Between Bossuet, Musichetta and Cosette, the conversation stayed very firmly in the realm of Disney, with them constantly demanding his opinions and thoughts and while Joly was very much aware that this was all an attempt to keep him from descending into full-fledged panic again (something that was sometimes only just barely kept at bay) as well as a way to force him to breathe deeply enough to form words he appreciated it all the same.

Finally, finally, there was a knock on the door and Cosette bounded up to get it. Joly listened to the loud thumping of feet and what must be gym bags and the accompanying loud, raucous voices of his two good friends as they made Cosette’s acquaintance.

“So, you’re telling me this emergency isn’t actually because of Laigle– _HA!_ ” Joly could hear Grantaire cut off and dissolve into laughter, soon followed by Bahorel’s booming laugh. He almost had to smile because he could only imagine what sort of sight he presented with two legs dejectedly sticking out from under a giant, ancient cabinet but couldn’t quite bring him to – he really, really just wanted them to get him out. Right now.

“What the hell happened here?” Bahorel demanded. Joly could hear his heavy foot steps as he wandered over and knocked comically on the side of the cabinet. “You in there, Jolllly?”

It was meant to be playful, he knew, but the knock was loud and reverberated and all Joly could think of was the crushing wood walls of his prison; a sob escaped from his throat again and he really just wanted to die of humiliation. It was one thing to sob pathetically around Bossuet and Musichetta, who’d had held him during his worst panic attacks, even one thing to sob around Cosette who he didn’t know, but he felt miserable and small crying around the others. He was suppose to be the happy one – maybe the slightly anxious one, but the good-humoured one too.

“Whoa, hey, don’t cry, buddy,” Bahorel said. “We’ll sort this out in a jiffy. Right, R?”

“We have to lift that?” Grantaire said, a little dubiously.

“Please,” Joly croaked and could feel Bossuet and Musichetta’s hands on him, comforting.

He felt Grantaire’s foot nudge against his gently. “Hey, don’t sweat it, Joly. I’m pretty sure I owe you about a million and one favours; we’ve got this.” Joly tried not to hear the undercurrent of uncertainty in Grantaire’s voice.

“Yeah,” Bahorel said. “You got me out of another hour of R’s shitty dance class.”

There was movement then. Bossuet’s hand left his – “Sorry, but we’ll need all of us to lift this, don’t worry, we’ll be back soon – and people were pacing around the cabinet. Bahorel and Grantaire were still talking good-naturedly though so Joly clung to that, clung to that proof that he wasn’t actually all alone in the darkness under the cabinet, that they weren’t leaving him, that he wouldn’t die.

“Just because you apparently have all the grace of a drunk ox doesn’t make the class is shitty. Only you,” said Grantaire.

“You should have seen it, Joly,” Bahorel said over top of Grantaire. “Bunch of guys in tights jumping around. I mean really, R could have taken me to his fencing class,  _that’d_  have been fucking amazing! Even to that billiards club or, what, tennis? What even all do you do? But yeah, those would have been cool. But no, he brought me to his fucking dance class.”

“You should have seen it, Joly,” Grantaire said, a mocking lilt in his voice. (It was a good lilt, Grantaire had had a lot of time to perfect it.) “Bahorel nearly pissed himself when girl who was, like, a foot shorter than him lifted him like it was goddamn nothing.”

“Okay, everyone got it?” Musichetta’s voice cut in. “Yes? Good. On three now…”

On three Joly could hear the creaking and grunting as five people attempted to raise the enormous, wooden cabinet. The pressure shifted ever so slightly from his back and Joly desperately tried to wiggle out but the space wasn’t enough and barely seconds had passed before it came to rest firmly against the floor again, making his ribs sing in pain as the weight came to rest in a different spot than before. He moaned loud and low as the other panted.

They made a couple more attempts but none were anymore successful than the first and they finally stopped when Joly started to hyperventilate, imagining breaking ribs and punctured lungs and broken backs despite the fact that the pain was no where near severe enough for it to be any more than possible bruising at worse. To his surprise it wasn’t Bossuet or Musichetta that talked him back down but Grantaire, though maybe he shouldn’t be because Joly had been in Grantaire’s apartment plenty before and had seen the little, orange pill bottles tucked almost out of sight in the kitchen. Either way, Grantaire handled the panic attack like an old pro and soon, though still shallow, Joly was once again breathing in a way that somewhat resembled a grown man.

“What are you going to do?” Joly asked miserably. He had no idea how long he had been stuck under there but was painfully aware that it had been a very long time indeed. Not only for himself but for his friends. He barely knew Cosette but she was still there, a soft, comforting voice and hand, but she must be getting sick of this stranger blocking up her living room and demanding her time. He didn’t know what he would do if any of his friends left, if anyone got sick of this and realized they wouldn’t be able to get him out and left. What if someone said they would have to leave it until morning? Was it that late, would he have to stay here over night? He would definitely die if he had to stay under the cabinet over night, he would suffocate in the tiny space. Trembling he demanded again, “What are we going to do?”

“We could maybe hire someone to come and do this?” Bossuet suggested.

“That could take ages,” Musichetta said.

“It might be too late for them to come tonight anyway,” Bahorel pointed out. Joly pressed his face against the floor to keep from sobbing out loud.

“What about the fire department?” Cosette suggested. Everyone took a moment to consider that. The fire department did cats up trees so why not Jolys under cabinets?

“Whose brick shithouse is this anyway?” Grantaire demanded. When Cosette informed him that it was her father’s he then asked her, seriously: “How much does he love it? ‘Cause I’ve got an emergency hatchet in my car and what me and Bahorel can’t move as a whole we can absolutely move as pieces.”

Bahorel made a noise of excited agreement – he wasn’t one to turn down pulverizing something with an axe – but Joly quaked at the idea of the cabinet crumbling above him, being deliberately broken into pieces, falling, crushing him beneath it… Bossuet’s hand rubbed soothing lines up and down his calf.

“Oh!” Cosette suddenly said. “Oh, I just realized! How stupid of me! Papa!”

The confusion in the room was tangible.

“No, you see, my papa, he’s very strong,” Cosette explained. “I should have called him immediately, he will be able to help for sure!”

Joly seriously doubted that one man – especially a man who must surely be well into middle age – would be able to tip the scales of their previous attempt at lifting the cabinet but no one had the heart to stop Cosette as she dialled her father’s number.

“Well,” Grantaire said, “let me know when you all want me to get the axe.”

“We’re not using an axe,” Musichetta told him severely.

“Don’t rain on my parade.”

“I think I deserve an axe after being forced to trapeze around on my toes like some wood elf,” Bahorel stated plainly.

“That is a very,  _very_  optimistic description of what you spent the class doing,” Grantaire said dryly.

“No axe!” Joly shouted from beneath the cabinet.

“But Jolllly,” Grantaire whined, “you’re suppose to be one of the fun ones! Don’t you want to get out of there?”

Breath hitching, Joly forced a long breath out of his nose. “Shit,” Grantaire said, “I didn’t mean it like that. You know we’re going to get you out of there, Joly, no matter what. Even if you are a party pooper.”

“Papa said he’ll be right over,” Cosette said then. “Until then… we could put on another movie?”

There was a bit of a debate over what to watch, but since Joly was the one trapped he got the final say so they were soon watching Musichetta’s first disc of the  _Pride and Prejudice_ mini-series when there was a knock on the door. The arrival of Cosette’s father was a relief for no other reason than it made the critiques in the room shut up; Bossuet suffered through the show with good grace because he had been forced through Joly and Musichetta’s marathons of it before, but Grantaire and Bahorel had no such reservations.

“Okay but here me out,” Bahorel was saying as Cosette went to get the door. “Grantaire as the grouchy, dark fellow with the social grace of a wet sock–”

“Darcy,” Musichetta supplied.

“And Enjolras as that sassy, self-righteous–”

“I will actually kill you if you finish that sentence,” Grantaire threatened as Joly howled with laughter despite how much it hurt. “Actually. I’ll do it with my fucking pointe shoes and make it look like a tragic accident.”

“Everyone, this is my papa,” Cosette called as she returned with someone walking in behind her.

“Jean,” the man said. He sounded soft-spoken and Joly tried to imagine what this man must look like – he didn’t sound like the sort of person that would be able to help lift a giant cabinet off him.

He must not be the only person to think so because Bahorel said, “It’s okay, sir, we have more friends that we could call to help…”

“We were thinking maybe we should call a professional,” Musichetta added hastily.

“Professional cabinet-lifters?” Jean asked good-naturedly, a touch of humour in his tone. “Don’t worry, I’m sure between us we should have no poroblem getting this off your friend, no need to leave the poor fellow under there any longer.”

Joly could hug this man.

“If you’re sure…” Grantaire said, the scepticism in his voice thick.

Cosette’s father either didn’t hear it or didn’t heed it, because Joly could hear him walk to one side of the cabinet.

“Now if you two lads will take the other side,” Jean said and if Joly twisted his head he could see Grantaire and Bahorel’s shoes on the side opposite.

“And us?” Bossuet asked.

There was a moment of consideration and then Jean said, “I think this should do us here, but if you’ll make sure he can get out quickly once we’ve lifted it.”

“You think this’ll be enough?” Grantaire demanded, incredulous. “We had all of us lifting before you came and could barely budge the thing! We need all the help we can get!”

“They will be helping,” Jean said calmly. “Now, if you’re ready?”

Joly could hear Grantaire make a frustrated noise, but both Bahorel and Grantaire’s feet shifted as they got a grip on the cabinet. Cosette’s father counted down from three and then–

And then it was off him.

“Jesus  _fucking CHRIST_ ,” exclaimed Grantaire at the same Bahorel barked a disbelieving “Holy  _shit!_ ”

Hands grabbed him and dragged him forcefully out and finally Joly’s lungs were able to expand completely, sucking in greedy mouthfuls of air as he collapsed onto his back and stared up at the great, open expanse of the room.

“Oh thank god, are you okay, Joly? I’m so sorry for telling you to get under there, Joly, I’m so sorry,” Musichetta said, going to him immediately and pulling him onto his lap, kissing him all over as he hugged her in relief.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s not your fault,” he panted, just happy to be able to do that. He coughed and sneezed, but mostly in an attempt to clear the dust out of his system and there was suddenly a cold glass of water being pressed into his hands.  

After he had stopped shaking quite so badly and the people who were in equal parts comforting and crowding him had thinned somewhat he stood up unsteadily.  “Thank you, sir, for coming to help me,” he said, reaching to shake Jean’s hand.

He could see why everyone had sounded so uncertain. Cosette’s father was definitely a large man, but he had a gentle face that didn’t look like it had an ounce of force behind it and very grey hair. When they shook hands though Joly could feel the strength in his grip.

After Joly had received a number of hugs and reassurances, Cosette and her father went off to the kitchen to talk and Joly had ended up on the couch wedged between Bossuet and Musichetta, neither of whom would let go of his hands. Someone had opened a window and Joly appreciated it, appreciated the cool, crisp, winter air that worked to remove the last traces of cramped, dusty stuffiness.

“He lifted that basically on his own,” Grantaire was saying in disbelief. “Just plucked it up like it was an empty cardboard box.”

“Didn’t even break a sweat,” Bahorel agreed, sounding envious. “Fuck your dancing, I want to do whatever it is he’s doing.”

“You’re all welcome to stay for dinner,” Cosette called, sticking her head out of the kitchen.

That was a very good thing, because Joly didn’t think he would be moving anywhere for a while.

“Okay,” Bahorel said, throwing himself into the tiny amount of space left at the one end of the couch, basically forcing the triad into a jumbled pile of overlapping limbs, “someone get that schmoopy movie out of the computer and stick it into the DVD player. I want to watch 19th century Enjolras and Grantaire try to–”

Grantaire made an aggressive lunge for Bahorel who clambered onto the back of the couch cackling and Joly reflected that, everything considered, today still wasn’t as bad as it could have been.


End file.
